President Obama has issued a national preparedness directive designed to update the federal government’s playbook for responding to emergencies such as natural disasters, terrorism, cyber attacks and pandemics.
Obama said the directive meant to both "galvanize action by the federal government," and facilitate "an integrated, all-of-nation, capabilities-based approach to preparedness."
The directive calls for a national preparedness goal identifying core capabilities necessary for preparedness and a national preparedness system all within the next year to guide activities that will enable the nation to achieve the goal, as well as a means to track progress putting capabilities in place.
It calls on the assistant to the President for homeland security and counterterrorism to coordinate the interagency development of an implementation plan for completing the national preparedness goal and national preparedness system – to be submitted for review by early June.
